Abercrombie & Fitch Send Up: Call Me…Definitely

It’s Monday morning and no doubt you’re depressed and putting on your winter clothes for the third consecutive week in JUNE, so I have a little treat to cheer you all up.  Now, what happens when you get about a gazillion bona-fide topless male Abercrombie & Fitch models from different capital cities around the world, add the sickest, happiest song of 2012, and get said puppets, I mean models, to mime along like they understand whats going on and jump out of flower beds, do a choreographed routine in front of the Notre Dame, and jiggle their pecks all for your entertainment?  Well…this is what happens people!

Did anyone else notice the select few models who REALLY got in to this?  Now, I am not one to necessarily objectify the male kind, but come on, when it is this funny…And let’s face it, even though I (along with many of our readers I guess) despise Abercrombie & Fitch with a burning passion, it is slightly refreshing to see male models being objectified rather than female ones.  And with the added bonus of a sprinkling of humour.  And wait, what is this?  A mixed raced model?!  Wow, Abercrombie must have finally got the memo Kennedy sent out in 1964.  Anyway, call me yeah?

Savile Row’s row with Abercrombie (and the likes)

Pardon the horrible pun, I couldn’t resist. Given my recent musings on the Abercrombie/Hollister brand, I found the news that The Chap magazine is launching a petition to stop plans for another Abercrombie & Fitch shop to be opened on the hallowed ground of Savile Row rather amusing. I imagine they were rather taken aback to discover they were considered to be below the standard for this exclusive area of London, given how keen they are to cultivate a sense of exclusivity to their brand. They did, after all, recently pay cast members of Jersey Shore (the American equivalent of Geordie Shore) not to wear their clothes onscreen.

The Chap magazine has a point, though. Savile Row is one of the few remaining bastions of good old-fashioned fine tailoring skill, and its bespoke suits have been hailed as the best in the world for over 200 years. With big brands like Abercrombie inching onto the scene, these traditions are under threat.

The petition will be formally presented to Westminster council, and has over 500 signatures already. David Coleridge of H. Huntsman & Sons said, “The arrival of Abercrombie & Fitch at the end of Savile row would dramatically change not just the tone but the safety of the street”.

In a letter to Boris Johnson, The Chap editor Gustav Temple, said: “Once that store is allowed to exist, there is no reason why other large chain stores, also peddling overpriced casual wear and T-shirts bearing slogans, will begin to fill up the other buildings.” It seems he’s right – according to Drapers, there has been a similar furore over the hipster brand The Kooples, who also want to open a shop on the street.

“This isn’t simply about resisting the global spread of chain stores, which market forces have made inevitable. It’s about preserving a little corner of Englishness in London. It’s only one street, for goodness’ sake, and why shouldn’t it remain exclusively dedicated to bespoke tailoring?” asks Temple.

If you want to help save Savile Row, you can sign the petition here.

Outgrowing Hollister

You can tell a lot about a man based on how he reacts to being taken into a shop like Abercrombie & Fitch, or Hollister, its little sister brand. It’s the real test of whether or not a man is ‘metrosexual’; if he can survive this shopping experience, he can survive anything.

I recently had a traumatic visit to a Hollister in an American mall. On the day in question, there’s a sale on, and on top of that there’s a further 50% off everything. I barely see the topless teenagers at the door, awkwardly sexualised in their Hollister brand tight jeans and trademark scent. I, after all, am used to the Abercrombie & Fitch in London. On particularly windy days you can smell it all the way down Bond Street; expensive and intoxicating. Men with aggressively toned chests stand guard over the unmarked door. Once inside the shop, to further the sense that this is a secret club that you have to be cool enough to know about, you have to navigate your way around in the darkness and flashing lights. It is a genuine worry that you won’t be able to hear the shop assistants (are they shop assistants or models? Will they stare blankly, or worse, walk away, if you try to ask them a question about jeans sizes?) over the loud club-scene soundtrack.

This Hollister is therefore tame in comparison, with its decorative surfboards, live stream of a Californian beach and ‘mellow’ Indie music. I can actually see the clothes, which makes a nice change. I set to work combing the shop for bargains, and notice that my boyfriend doesn’t look terribly comfortable. He doesn’t seem to know where to look, and when a shop assistant asks him how he’s doing he jumps and mumbles that he’s fine. I don’t think he even knows – or wants to know – where the men’s section is. I lose him for a few minutes while I’m looking for a pretty camisole in my size. As I join the queue for the changing rooms he turns up with a pained expression on his face, and tells me that he needs some air. ‘I’ll be outside if you need me,’ he says apologetically.

As he explains later, places like that are too tied up with the douchebags of his high school memories for him to be able to stand them. That’s okay, I say; I like shopping alone. I pride myself on my ability to dive in, ignore the over-the-top branding, and clear-mindedly judge what I want, I tell myself. I am a lioness shopper, I do not get distracted. But deep down I’m wondering how much of the appeal is actually in the clothes, and how much is the packaging. Maybe it’s easier to shop alone because it’s easier to ignore the ridiculously pumped up shiny teens staring down at me and approving me as one of the ‘cool kids’. True, the camis are nice, but seen through my definitely-not-metrosexual boyfriend’s eyes, I can’t get away from how silly it all is. Am I getting too old for Hollister?

Are there any labels where you feel the branding puts you off the clothes? Let us know, below.